Life — March 22, 1894 — page 9: what you’re looking at

Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.

“And a man's foes shall be they of his own household.” CHARACTERS FROM THE HOUSEHOLD OF THOMAS BAILEY ALDRICH. { Only daughter of an old New England family. {Of New York, rich and Jou Fuemainc, . +1” twenty-four. Tom Bailey. Maxyoue Daw,. Tur Bap Boy,. Scexe: The bread piazza of an old colonial mansion, with gambrel roof and rambling extensions, at a crossroad near Kye, In a shady corner a hammock isswung and in ita girl, of eighteen, with gold- en hair and dark eyes, swaying “ like @ pond lily in th golden afternoe In a wicker chair, very near the hammock, is JOuN FLEMMING, Marjorie Daw (indignantly): To think that Mr, Aldrich dared to put it in the story that there wasn't any colonial mansion, any piazza, any hammock, any Marjorie Daw ! Joun FremMi I believe that he was in league with Delaney, who must have been in love with you himself, to throw me off the track and make me give up the search for the ideal woman I loved. MARJORIE (confidently): They don't know how steadfast you are, dear. Joun (trying to appear modest): It was not that exactly, I knew prosaic, old Delaney too well to believe that he could invent a girl like you out of whole cloth. I was sure that he had an original in his mind's eye. SoI took rooms at the Surf House, and drove all the roads and bye-ways around Rye till I found you. MARJORIE (with beaming face) : is better than Mr. Aldrich’s story ? Jounx (flattering) : He did not do you half justice. (The hammock swings conveniently near). MARjoRI But I like Mr. Aldrich and his stories very much, John, and you must, too. He often comes down this way to Stillwater to call on the Shackfords. You know he wrote a book about them and that awful murder case ? Joun (recollecting): Oh, yes, ‘The Stillwater Tragedy.” Read it when I was laid up with my lame leg; knew Durgin And this would be the real ten words, lain before he had spoken That is no kind of a detective story. If you want the real thing you ought to read “* The Leavenworth Case.” MARJORIE (severely): You New York men are such Philistines! Mr. Aldrich is a genuine man of letters. He would not stoop to detec- tive stories, He writes ferature. 187 (A five minutes’ indignant silence, and an affectionate reconciliation), MARJORIE (in her instructive manner): If you are really and truly sorry, you must learn to appreciate Aldrich fully as I do. Joun (resignedly): Go ahead, please! 1 am in a receptive mood. MARJORIE (laying down the law): You mast understand first then that New England women havea great admiration for Aldrich’s work, because so much of it deals with New England people and scenery. Joun (who hos been allowed to smoke): Queer, isn't it? You are never tired reading and writing about yourselves. Now in New York most of the men and women I know would rather read anything else than a New York novel. MARJORIE: (forntedly) : them worth reading. JOUN (rising to the occasion on "rings o smoke): 1am not so sure of that, ‘There.are Bunner, Janvier, Bangs, Hibbard, Matthews, There are so few of * JOUN, IF WE ARE TO BE MAPPY TOGETHER YOU MUST NEVEK, NEVER SPEAK LIGHTLY OF MY New Ectano 1pois.”” Joun (hedging): 1 don't doubt it. But it took something more than mere literature to make me forget that my leg was aching. MARJORIE (torth @ tremble in her voice) : John, if we are to be happy together you must never, never speak lightly of my New England idols. JONN (meekly): All right, my dear, make a list of them and I'll worship the whole lot— Emerson, Longfellow, Hawthorne, Lowell, Whittier, Holmes, Aldrich. MARJORIE (cutting in): Stop, stop! Don’t mention anybody else in the same breath ! Joun (curtly): Amen! Hopkinson Smith, Mrs. Harrison, Mrs. Cruger —each of them has written a good story or two. about New York. But we don’t make so much ado about that sort of thing as you do. We have a host of other things to interest us. Marjorie: Oh, I knowall that. You are rank materialists, and are never worth much till you marry New England girls. (Coguet- tishly) \isn’t a bad combination. JOHN (admtringly) ; You bet it isn’ MARJORIE (confidently) : What fun I'll have spiritualizing you! To go back to the Aldrich cure. You'll begin by reading ** The Queen of Sheba." It’s a love story, and perhaps you comicbooks.com